The Great Survivors Read online

  In contrast to the rest of European royalty, the Swedish monarch is almost completely devoid of formal political power, as a result of the new constitution that came into force in 1975, two years after King Carl XVI Gustaf, the current monarch, succeeded his nonagenarian grandfather, Gustaf VI Adolf. Swedish politicians had been arguing for years about how to modernize the monarchy – and indeed, whether to continue to have a king at all. The Social Democrats, who dominated Swedish politics from the 1930s, had always been committed to turning their country into a republic, even if they proved reluctant to take any concrete steps in that direction, for fear of upsetting their core voters, many of whom were ardent royalists. The right, by contrast, were determined to keep the king.

  Almost as soon as Gustaf VI Adolf succeeded his father in 1950, work began on a new constitution in which everything – including the retention of the monarchy – was up for discussion. Indeed, the Bernadotte dynasty’s days looked numbered in 1966 when a bill introduced by some thirty Social Democratic MPs calling for the abolition of the monarchy won a majority in both houses of parliament. “Monarchy can only be regarded as an irrational system, with its future in its past,” they asserted. “Feelings ‌in its favour are waning.”8 Yet concerns about the reaction from the public prevailed, and the same majority rejected calls to put the proposal to a referendum. It was decided instead to hand the delicate matter to a constitutional commission.

  After much deliberation, the commission hammered out a compromise in August 1971 at a meeting at Torekov, an exclusive summer resort on Sweden’s south-western coast: the king would remain as head of state but be stripped of all but his ceremonial and representational functions. The 1809 constitution had begun its definition of the monarch’s powers with the words “The King alone has the right to govern the realm” – a right that, for the first decades, had been limited only by a duty to ask the opinion of a council that he had himself appointed.

  The current document starts instead with the words “All public power in Sweden derives from the people” – which is then conferred on parliament and government. However, in deference to the old King, who was due to celebrate his ninetieth birthday in November the following year, it was decided that the change, if agreed, would not come into effect until after his death.

  By removing the monarch entirely from the political sphere, the Swedes were taking to a logical conclusion the gradual reduction in royal influence that had been taking place across Europe for the previous two centuries. This new document was, to a great extent, merely adapting the constitutional text to fit reality: real political power had long since drained away from the palace. But it also meant concrete changes in the way the system functions. Since 1975, it is the speaker of the Riksdag rather than the king who acts as a broker in the formation of government coalitions and appoints the prime minister. The monarch no longer presides over cabinet meetings, rubber-stamps bills or takes the title of commander-in-chief of the armed forces, though he does chair a committee on foreign policy. In the words of Olof Palme, the then prime minister, the reforms reduced the monarchy to a feather in the hat. Sweden, he declared, could easily be turned into a republic “with a stroke of the pen”.

  This Swedish model is attractive to those who want to cling to the ceremonial trappings of royalty but whose democratic sentiments are affronted by having anyone granted political powers merely on the basis of heredity. It also obviates the need for a president, who could become a divisive party-political figure. Yet some critics are not satisfied, claiming the accident of the monarch’s birth still automatically gives him an authority denied other citizens, especially when he chooses to speak out on issues. Carl XVI Gustaf has certainly chosen to do so on various occasions in recent years, often provoking controversy, whether criticizing neighbouring Norway’s seal culls or upsetting environmentalists at home by calling for the killing of some of his country’s wolf population. A Christmas speech in which he urged his subjects to work harder was also seized on by critics who wondered if a hereditary monarch was best placed to express such sentiments.

  Despite the attractions of the Swedish model, it has not so far been emulated elsewhere in Europe. Indeed, in May 2011, Mark Rutte, the Dutch prime minister, wrote to parliament explicitly opposing any formal restrictions to the powers of the monarch. “The monarch is certainly the symbol of power, but does not herself possess any power,” he said. Many in parliament were not convinced, however. In recent years, the Dutch monarchy’s traditional critics on the left and in the centre have been joined by Geert Wilders’s Freedom Party (PVV), which has been angered by the Queen’s calls for social cohesion and what it sees as her excessive respect for Muslim sensibilities. In September 2011, Wilders put forward a proposal in parliament to remove the monarch from the political system, but the move foundered on the requirement for a two-thirds majority to implement constitutional change. Yet, with relations between the Queen and the PVV set to remain poor, further attempts to limit royal power seem likely.

  Alone of Europe’s monarchies, tiny Liechtenstein has bucked the trend towards a reduction in royal power. In a referendum in March 2003, nearly two thirds of the electorate backed a new constitution, proposed by Prince Hans-Adam II, which instead added considerably to his influence. The vote represented the culmination of a long and messy battle between the Prince and his parliament. The Prince Hans-Adam, who had been effectively running the principality since his ageing father transferred executive powers to him in 1984, had threatened that he and his family would move to Austria if the referendum failed, and even joked about selling Liechtenstein.

  “We might indeed decide to leave the country,” Hans-Adam said in an interview in 2000 that reflected the unique relationship between the ruling family and their tiny country. “But that would not be the end of the principality, because until 1938 my ancestors also lived in Austria and came down here only once a year or so. My ancestors bailed out Liechtenstein when it was bankrupt and thus acquired sovereign rights. If ever the people decided time is up for this ruling family, they would have to find someone else rich enough to take our place. But I am confident ‌it won’t come to that.”9

  Despite opposition led by Mario Frick, a former prime minister, the people backed their prince. He is not only able veto any law he dislikes, he can also dismiss the government or any minister at will. The result has been to make him effectively Europe’s only absolute monarch.

  ‌Chapter 4

  ‌An Ordinary Day at Work

  The 10th of December has a special significance for Sweden and its royal family. On this day in 1896, at the age of sixty-three, Alfred Nobel, a rich and highly successful Swedish chemist, died of a stroke in the Italian Mediterranean resort of San Remo, where he had made his home five years earlier. A pacifist and poet, the eccentric Nobel had intended that dynamite, his most famous invention, should be used only for peaceful purposes. To his dismay it proved even more useful for warfare. And so, partly to assuage his conscience – and partly to burnish the family name – when he sat down in 1895 to write his will, Nobel pledged the bulk of his fortune, equivalent to around $250 million today, to establish a series of awards to recognize excellence in science, literature and peace. In 1901, after some wrangling with both Nobel’s heirs and the French tax authorities, the first Nobel Prizes ceremony was held. To add prestige to the event, the awards were handed out by Crown Prince Gustaf.

  More than a century later, what began as a relatively low-key Scandinavian event has turned into the most prestigious prize-giving ceremony in the world – and the high point of the Swedish royal calendar. When the laureates in literature, medicine, physics, chemistry and economics – the last of which was added in 1969 – gather for the gala ceremony in Stockholm’s concert hall, it is currently Gustaf’s great-grandson, Carl XVI Gustaf, who hands them each a diploma and medal. The King and his family also have pride of place at a sumptuous banquet for 1,300 people – including 250 students – held later that day in the Stockholms S
tadshus (Stockholm City Hall). To add to the lavishness, both venues are decorated with flowers flown in from San Remo.

  Sweden’s media wallow in the spectacle: newspapers record the number of pigeon breasts and lobster tails eaten and bottles of wine and champagne drunk, while these days their reporters blog and tweet a running commentary from their tables. Invariably, attention focuses less on the elderly men and women honoured for their worthy but often incomprehensible academic achievements than on the glamorous guests – chief among them the King’s daughters, Crown Princess Victoria and her beautiful younger sister, Madeleine. Which ball gowns are the princesses wearing, which jewels have they selected from the Bernadotte family collection and (at least until Victoria’s wedding in June 2010) which men are on their arms?

  The same day, 250 miles to the west, a similar ceremony takes place. The Nobel Peace Prize, the most prestigious of the awards, is awarded not in Stockholm but in Oslo – and here Carl XVI Gustaf’s fellow monarch, King Harald V, plays his part. In the richly decorated reception hall of the City Hall, in front of a thousand guests, the prize is handed over – although by the chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee rather than by the King, who together with his immediate family is seated in the place of honour. That evening there is a glittering banquet in the Grand Hotel.

  For the Kings of both Sweden and Norway, what has become known as Nobel Week is merely the most high-profile of a series of engagements – from the glamorous to the humdrum – that fill their year. There was a time when the role of monarchs was to rule, with ceremonial activities such as handing out prizes or medals little more than a public manifestation of such power. Yet, as was seen in the previous chapter, such political power has almost completely drained away, leaving today’s kings and queens in search of another role, which they have found in representational engagements such as the Nobel ceremonies. It is these functions, whether trips to obscure provincial factories or glittering state visits to important trading partners, that have come to constitute the bulk of their work. Europe’s royal families have become part of the public-relations wing of Great Britain plc, Nederland BV or Sverige AB.

  The various events attended by members of the royal families are laid out in their official reports and websites. Take Sweden’s Carl XVI Gustaf. A visit to www.royalcourt.se reveals that during March 2012 he took part in no fewer than twenty-one events, ranging from a formal gathering of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, an audience with the President of the Royal Swedish Academy of Agriculture and Forestry and hosting the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall on an official visit to a trip to the Cross-Country Skiing World Cup Final. King Harald, meanwhile, was listed as having more than one hundred and forty engagements over the year, from audiences with foreign diplomats to cultural and sporting events – as well as chairing the weekly meeting of the cabinet. Harald’s son Crown Prince Haakon and other members of the family also make their fair share of outings. And then there are the various ceremonial events, chief among them the 17th of May, Constitution Day, marked in Norway not with shows of military force but with children’s parades – including one in Oslo, drawing up to 100,000 people, who are greeted by the royal family from the balcony of the palace, as well as the state opening of parliament every October.

  When it comes to public appearances, however, it is the British royal family who are the most active. The journalist Robert Hardman, who followed the Windsors for a year for a BBC documentary, estimated Queen Elizabeth II and thirteen members of her family would perform 4,000 engagements over the twelve months. And although now well into her eighties, our monarch is showing little signs of slowing down. All are reported in a document issued by Buckingham Palace every day known as the Court Circular. Established in the early nineteenth century by George III, frustrated at the inaccurate reporting of his movements, it is now published by the Times, the Daily Telegraph and the Scotsman. In keeping with the palace’s enthusiastic embrace of new technology, a searchable version is also included on the website.

  Queen Elizabeth II’s calendar each year includes the usual regular meetings with politicians and audiences with diplomats, as well as the more routine dinners and openings. She must also present some 2,500 honours, handed out at twenty or so investitures. In addition there are also high-profile fixed events, rich in the pageantry that characterizes the British monarchy: besides the state opening of parliament there is the Trooping of the Colour, a military parade marking the Queen’s “official birthday” ‌on a Saturday in June,1 the closest Britain comes to a national day. The Queen also presides for the third week of June over the Royal Meeting at Ascot Racecourse, west of London. In a tradition dating back to the 1820s and the reign of King George IV, she and her party begin each day with the Royal Procession, during which they parade along the track in front of racegoers in horse-drawn landaus. This is more than just duty for the Queen: a keen horsewoman, she has owned more than twenty winners at Royal Ascot.

  Other members of the royal family, meanwhile, have similar duties of their own, often chosen to reflect their own interests. Prince Philip has been active in science, conservation and youth welfare; the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award scheme for the under twenty-fives has been imitated across the world since he created it in the 1950s; Prince Charles is especially interested in farming and the built environment. As they have come of age, Princes William and Harry, although both in the armed forces, find time to devote to various charities. In part, these reflect their own interests: William, for example, works with Tusk, a small British charity devoted to African wildlife, while his brother helped create Sentebale, a charity to help deprived children in Lesotho, where he spent several months after leaving school. William has also taken over some of the charity work of the late Princess Diana, and is a patron of Centrepoint, a charity that works with homeless young people. It is the princes’ aunt, Princess Anne, though, who notches up the most engagements – more than six hundred a year, including at least three major overseas tours.

  The extent to which participation in such events, or other “duties” such as visits to the ballet, an art exhibition or cinema festival, constitutes work – at least in the sense that the rest of us understand the term – is a matter for debate. Yet whenever there is media discussion in Britain of the sums paid to minor members of the royal family, the question of whether they are “worth it” is conducted largely in terms of how many such appearances they make. Purely by their presence, monarchs and their families arguably provide a public service to their subjects who treasure any contact with them, however fleeting or superficial.

  The possibility of such a royal contact is the entire raison d’être of the royal garden parties, invitations to which have turned into a form of reward for public service. The first events were first held in the 1860s when Queen Victoria instituted what were known as “breakfasts” (even though they were held in the afternoon). These days, four are held each year – three in Buckingham Palace and one at Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh – attended by more than thirty thousand guests, whose names are put forward by government, the armed services or other bodies. The British monarchy is justly proud of the precision with which such events are choreographed. In more than half a century and what must be tens of thousands of public appearances, the Queen has never made a mistake.

  An important category of such spectacles are the intrinsically private occasions – such as marriages, births and deaths – that have been transformed by first the newsreels and then television into huge public media events. When the future King George V married Princess May of Teck (later Queen Mary) in 1893 in the Chapel Royal, St James’s Palace, there was room for only a hundred people. When his great-great-grandson Prince Charles wed Lady Diana Spencer in the considerably grander setting of St Paul’s Cathedral in 1981, there were three thousand five hundred people in the congregation, another six hundred thousand on the streets of London and an estimated television audience across the world of seven hundred and fifty million. More recently, the ma
rriage of Crown Princess Victoria and Daniel Westling in June 2010 was the culmination of two weeks of celebration in which Stockholm was transformed into a “capital of love” with flowers and performances throughout the city – and rival functions organized by republicans who saw this as the perfect occasion to try to drum up support for their cause. The wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton in April 2011 was an even bigger international media event.

  The media wedding par excellence was undoubtedly that between Prince Rainier of Monaco and Grace Kelly in April 1956. In a foretaste of the kind of deals now commonplace between celebrities and magazines such as Hello! or OK!, MGM studios negotiated the rights to film the ceremony for its documentary, The Wedding of the Century, turning Monaco cathedral into a film set. In return, not only did the couple receive a $7,226 wedding gown designed by MGM’s head costume designer, Helen Rose, the services of an MGM hairdresser and publicity executive and a substantial share of the proceeds, but the film, seen by an estimated thirty million television viewers across the world, also meant valuable publicity for a principality keen to expand its tourist business.

  A similar function is served by royal births. Court officials may no longer be crowded into the delivery room – or in an adjoining room as was until quite recently the case – but hoards of photographers are sure to be waiting outside, hungry for an image of the newest addition to the royal family. Funerals can also play an important role in strengthening the monarchy; the sight of the coffin of a beloved elderly king or queen borne through the streets in a lavish cortège can unite a nation in grief. The effect is even stronger in the case of those such as Britain’s Princess Charlotte, Belgium’s Queen Astrid or Monaco’s Princess Grace, who were cut down in their prime. There has been one important exception, though: following the death of Princess Diana in 1997, the royal family was pilloried by the media for maintaining a traditional stiff upper lip despite the near-hysterical public reaction. And during the funeral itself, comments made by Diana’s brother, Earl Spencer, were interpreted as a thinly veiled attack on the monarchy itself.